Humanising Language Teaching
Year 5; Issue 4; July 03

Jumping round the circle

In one sense this is a crude, behaviourist drill, but the movement and laughter redeem it:

Level : Beginner to Intermediate

Time : 10 minutes

Preparation

Choose any set of words you want the students to work on, e.g.

food: cheese salad chicken
sleep: pillow bed yawn

Put each word from the chosen set on a separate card. Each student will need a card, so you may have to make several sets.

In class

1. Give each student a word card.

2. Split your class into groups of 10-14 and ask them to check in the group that they understand the words they have been given.

3. Make an open space in the room so that each group can stand in an inward-facing circle. Ask each student to draw a circle round where s/he is standing in chalk, except for one person who goes and stands in the centre of the circle.

4. Ask each student to call out the word on her/his card, preceded by an adjective of her/his choice - so A, holding the word salad, might call out green salad. Ask them to call out their adjective-noun combinations in turn several times.

5. The person in the centre of the circle now calls out three or four of the adjective-noun combinations, previously proposed by the group members, as fast a s/he can. The people whose words are called out must change chalk circles and the person in the middle must also try to get into a chalk circle. This means that one person is always left without a circle: s/he now goes into the centre and calls out combinations.

Acknowledgement

Ken Sprague, the artist and psychodramatist, played this game with us as a warm-up to a sociodrama session.